From the Tenth Century Account of Ealdorman Aethelweard)

Stained glass window, 20th century, commemorating the anniversary of St. Bartholomew school in the church of St. Bartholomew, Hyde. Photograph by Joe Low

“In the year 899. the magnanimous Alfred passed from the world. King of the Saxons, unshakeable pillar of the western people, a man replete with justice, vigorous in warfare, learned in speech, above all instructed in divine learning. For he had translated unknown numbers of books from rhetorical Latin speech into his own language – so variously and richly, that his book of Boethius would arouse tearful emotions not only in those familiar with it but even in those hearing it for the first time. For the king died on the seventh day before the Feast of All Saints… HIS BODY LIES AT PEACE IN WINCHESTER Now reader say, ‘O, Christ Our Redeemer, save his soul.” (From the tenth century account of Ealdorman Aethelweard)

HYDE900 2 Hyde Abbey and the Remains of Alfred the Great

yde Abbey was established in the first decade of the twelfth century to accommodate the Hcommunity and the treasures of New Minster, Winchester.

New Minster had been built in the years 899-904 in the centre of the city – close to where the cathedral is today - as the final resting place of King The procession transferring the bones of Alfred the Great (reigned 871-899), his King Alfred and his family from Old wife Alswitha, his son King Edward Minster to New Minster in 1110. and other members of the Royal House of Wessex. In 1110 the royal remains (and accompanying treasures such as the However, in the decades after 1066, as Gold Cross of Canute, illustrated the new Norman regime entrenched above*) were carried with great pomp itself, the abbey had to move to a new and reverence to their new resting site in Hyde, to the north of the city. place for reburial before the high altar of the abbey church.

Left: 11th Century, from the ‘Liber Vitae’ (Book of Life), illustrating the donation of a gold cross (one of the ‘Treasures of Hyde Abbey’) to New Minster by King Cnut and his wife Emma.

Bird’s eye view of Hyde Abbey from the south-west. Drawing by Nick McPherson.

1110-1538: The abbey Four years later, when the famous flourishes and then dies antiquary John Leland visited the site in 1542 the Abbey was already espite suffering from the a thing of the past. “In this suburbe effects of civil war, fires stood the great abbay of Hyde…” he and the Black Death the commented. “The bones of Alfred, Abbey survived for more King of the West Saxons, and of Dthan four hundred years and over this Edward his sone and king, were time it became a place of pilgrimage. translated from he Newan Ministre, and laid in a tomb before the high However, with the start of the English altar at Hyde. In the which tomb there Reformation under Henry VIII, was of late found two little tables of the abbey’s days were numbered. lead, inscribed with their names.” The Abbey was finally dissolved in 1538 and the ‘stripping of the altars’ The ‘great abbaye’ was no longer commenced. But, as far as one can there. But the great King and his tell, what lay underground – including family remained. the royal graves - was mostly left undisturbed.

HYDE900 3 1788: The Year That Disaster Struck

or 250 years - from 1538 until themselves were put to work digging 1788 – the choir end of Hyde the foundations and in doing so – or Abbey where Alfred and his maybe in reburying materials from family members lay buried - other parts of the site – they started to Fwas gradually forgotten about. This come across a number of subterranean all changed, however, in 1788 when graves from across the abbey site. the land was taken over by the county authorities as they site of a small local One observer, the local Catholic prison or ‘bridewell’. The convicts priest, Dr. Milner wrote:

“Miscreants couch amidst the ashes of our Alfreds and Edwards….. In digging for the foundations of that mournful edifice [the bridewell] at almost every stroke of the mattock or spade some ancient sepulchre was violated, the venerable contents of which were treated with marked indignity.”

‘The bones thrown about’ happened in the area of the Royal graves (before the altar) to a visiting he overseer of this horror antiquary, Captain Henry Howard was a man named Page (the who drew up a rough plan of the Keeper of the bridewell). east end of the church as a record of Ten years later Page was to the lay-out. Subsequently Howard Tprovide a detailed account of what reported what he had been told: “A great stone coffin was found, cased with lead both within and without, and containing some bones and remains of garnets. The lead, in its decayed state, sold Abbot’s crosier from Hyde for two guineas; the bones were thrown about Abbey, believed and the stone coffin broken into pieces. There to date from the first half of 13th were also two other coffins and no more century, now in the Victoria & found in this part, which were also broke Albert Museum. for the sake of the garden in which they lay, Found during the excavations of broken up and buried as low as the spring.” 1788.

This was the critical point when the So by the end of 1788 the royal Royal bones – along with many others bones were probably smashed in part, – were wrenched from the relative scattered and reburied to the level of security of their graves, disarticulated the water-table. But exactly where was and exposed to the rough elements. not clear.

Two carved stone capitals, 12th century, probably from the cloisters of Hyde Abbey. Now on display in the church of St. Bartholomew, Hyde. Photos: Sophie Cunningham Dawe.

Window glass from Hyde Tracery work from Hyde Abbey recently Abbey, re-cycled into the found by Wessex north wall of the church Archaeology. of St. Bartholomew, Image: Hyde. Photo: Sophie Winchester Cunningham Dawe. Museums.

HYDE900 4 1800-1866: The Age of Indignation

Sketch plan of A little later, in October 1825 the the area of Hyde great writer and campaigner William Abbey Church Cobbett, visiting Winchester, wrote: from ‘Enquiries etc. concerning the “How am I to describe what I felt when Tomb of King Alfred I saw in Hyde Meadow, a County at Hyde Abbey’ Bridewell, standing on the very spot, where by Henry Howard stood the Abbey, which was founded and published in endowed by Alfred, which contained the Archaeologia 1798. bones of that maker of the English name.”

n the first half of the 19th The bridewell, however, was not to last century understanding gradually long. It was demolished in the late- spread of what had happened 1840s and once again the site of Hyde on the Hyde Abbey site. Many Abbey was tuned over to rough land. Ivisitors to Winchester expressed their shock and indignation. Captain Twenty years later a literary event Howard was foremost amongst these was to set off a train of events which as he wrote: culminated in the construction of the ‘Unmarked Grave’. “You will lament with me the failure of my researches, and feel some share of Illustrations from the same indignation, when I inform you around 1800 of that the ashes of the great Alfred, after the church of St. being scattered about by the hands of Bartholomew with convicts, are now probably covered by a the east end in a building erected for their confinement and state of neglect, punishment. And when you are told that and Hyde Gate this occurred so lately as the year 1788, and the Almoners and that no-one in the neighbourhood , led Hall used for either by curiosity or veneration for his agricultural remains, attempted to discover or rescue purposes. them from this ignoble fate, your surprise will not, I think , be any less than my own.”

John Mellor arrives on the venture into the murky ground of scene ‘searching for Alfred’.

n 1866 ‘The Chronicle and His impact on the story create waves Chartulary of Hyde Abbey’ which are still felt today. was published, This collected together a large number of Arriving in Winchester in the Autumn Iancient Anglo-Saxon texts. It generated of 1866 Mellor gained permission a lot of interest and put Hyde Abbey to explore the site of Hyde Abbey. and its link with the Royal House of Armed with a copy of the plan (above Wessex back on the map. left) drawn up by Captain Howard, Mellor felt confident that he could One especially keen reader was a rediscover the bones of the Royal somewhat eccentric antiquarian, House of Wessex and, as he put it, John Mellor, a ‘historian and strolling ‘gaze upon the skeleton of the much student’ who had also read Dr. loved and venerable Saxon warrior, Milner’s account of the disgraceful the bravest of England’s sons.” 1788 excavation and was inspired to

View of Hyde Gate and Almoners’ Hall from the north, late 18th century taken from “An Historical Account of Winchester” by Charles Ball, 1818.

HYDE900 5 The Mellor Excavations And The Construction Of The Unmarked Grave

he last few months of 1866 and the beginning of 1867 marked a time of deep controversy in Winchester Tcaused by the antics of John Mellor which cast an adverse shadow over Photograph of the five skulls found by John subsequent investigations. Mellor in 1866 and claimed by him to be those of King Alfred and members of Mellor’s made a ‘best guess’ as to the Royal House of Wessex. These were where the altar area of the church subsequently deposited in the Unmarked lay and was successful in turning up Grave and reappeared when the grave a number of skeletal remains. These was opened in March 2013. Source: were put on display on the site and Hampshire Archives and Local Studies exposed to the shocked gaze of local worthies. Photographs were taken of Part of the lively the five impressive skulls which Mellor correspondence in the had discovered one of which, Mellor Hampshire Chronicle asserted, was Alfred’s own. in January 1867 regarding John Mellor’s Unfortunately Mellor then made a excavations. Source: series of manifestly false claims about Hampshire Archives what he had found – including a silver and Local Studies sceptre – and compounded this by planting obviously fraudulent lead Hyde Street looking tablets purporting to be from the North, 1903. tenth century into the ground by way Photo: W T Green. of authentication. Not surprisingly Winchester Museums. he was derided as a charlatan and there was extensive correspondence in the Hampshire Chronicle about his activities. Bones for Ten Bob

et however foolish Mellor might have been there were some people, including the Revd. William Williams ofY St, Bartholomew Church, who were intrigued by the discoveries. Church of St. Bartholomew, Hyde from the They did not discount the possibility south showing how it would have looked that they might indeed be those of before the construction of the tower in 16th Alfred and his family. As a result century from stones of Hyde Abbey. Photo: Hugh Wyeth, the churchwarden of Rose Burns St. Bartholomew’s, was instructed to buy from Mellor the skeletal remains Memorial to the Revd. which he had found. The price paid William Williams, south was ten shillings. wall of the church of St. Bartholomew, Hyde. A variety of grandiose proposals were Photo: Joe Low. made for the burial of the bones but in the end, due to their uncertain provenance, they were deposited in a brick-lined vault, under a ledger stone, The Unmarked Grave built adjacent to the east end of the church. in 1867 in the graveyard of The ‘Unmarked Grave’ was now to be St. Bartholomew, Hyde on a focus of debate and speculation for the instructions of the Revd. nigh on the next 150 years. William Williams for the reburial of bones discovered by John Mellor. Photo: Joe Low.

HYDE900 6 A Century Of Scepticism

he storm of controversy brewed up John Mellor’s showmanship gradually subsided. There were still Tmany sceptics but, nonetheless, the fascination with the site of Hyde Abbey persisted.

The first major renewal of activity came in the 1890’s. By this time Eighteenth century map illustrating the public interest in King Alfred had suburb of Hyde and the site of Hyde soared on a wave of imperial idealism Abbey and the church of St. Bartholomew. and. with the approach looming of Source: Hampshire Archives and Local the thousandth anniversary of his Studies. death (mistakenly to be believed to be 901 although actually it was 899), Winchester worthies decided to revisit the grave site. The key mover was Alfred Bowker, Lord Mayor of Winchester from 1897 to 1898, who was responsible for the installation of the statue of King Alfred in the Broadway and heavily involved in the 1901 Millennium celebrations for Alfred. Under his auspices in Eighteenth century map illustrating the 1897 there was a fresh excavation suburb of Hyde and the site of Hyde in the area of Mellor’s work and Abbey and the church of St. Bartholomew. various smaller bones appear to have Source: Hampshire Archives and Local resurfaced and been reburied in the Studies. ‘backfill’. Their significance was not, perhaps, fully understood. Community archaeology and ’The Search for Alfred’

etween 1995 and 1999 a community project – ‘The Search for Alfred’ – was led 1999 Hyde Abbey Community by the Winchester Museum Archaeology excavation. Photo: Winchester BService. This ranged extensively over Museums. the whole site of Hyde Abbey (not just the abbey church) and achieved significant results in clarifying details about the abbey buildings. There was also much excitement at the discovery of fine sculpted female head, probably a corbel, which highlighted once more the quality of the carving in the abbey.

When it came to an examination of the choir and altar area of the church, A representation of the choir of the abbey the excavators were able to get a better church from the glass engraving by Tracey understanding of the possible location Sheppard on Hyde Abbey Garden. Photo: of the royal graves. Meanwhile, at Sophie Cunningham Dawe the upper level, a female pelvis was found which proved to be of the late Artist Kate Dicker’s painting of Hyde medieval period. But, as far as human Abbey Garden from the Hyde900 remains were concerned, nothing else exhibition, ‘Re-imagining Treasures of of significance was noted at the time. Hyde Abbey’, 2010. Image: Kate Dicker.

HYDE900

7 The Hyde900 Investigation 2010-2014: Setting Up

he year 2010 marked the n Spring 2013 approval was nine hundredth anniversary given for the Hyde900 project of the establishment of to go ahead and on Monday Hyde Abbey and the arrival 25th March, in the presence of a Tin Hyde of the bones of the Wessex IBBC film crew, the grave was opened Royal family of King Alfred the Great, by a team from the University of his wife Alswitha and their son King Winchester led by osteo-archaeologist Edward. Dr. Katie Tucker. This revealed a large collection of bones including those In order to mark the occasion a group which appeared to be those found by of local residents set-up Hyde900 as a Mellor. community-based charity to organize a wide series of events to celebrate the These were then taken to the history of the area, its environment University of Winchester and stored and the character of its residents. A until August when permission was range of activities followed including, given by the Diocese for Dr. Tucker notably, a re-enactment of the to clean and examine the bones and procession which brought the royal prepare them for radiocarbon dating bones to Hyde. But there were also by Dr. Tom Higham of the Oxford a number of exhibitions organized, Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit at the books written and published, literary University of Oxford. What would the groups established, concerts held and analysis reveal? social events set-up.

With so much focus on the legacy on the abbey, the question was raised whether advantage should be taken of the latest technology to examine the contents of the Unmarked Grave (now popularly regarded as containing the royal bones).

With the encouragement of the Scene from the Hyde900 community Revd. Cliff Bannister and the support procession in 2010, from the site of New of the University of Winchester, a Minster to Hyde, to mark the 900th Grave Investigation Group (made anniversary of the arrival of the remains of up of a doctor, a scientist, a lawyer, Alfred the Great and his family in Hyde. a journalist, a local studies librarian, Photo: Joe Low. an artist and an archaeologist) undertook the complicated tasks of persuading the Diocesan authorities to give approval for the exhumation

E N M R ONK O S R T O X AD and testing of the bones. Following S A

D Y

two years of work and discussion H

with various partners – and against FORECOURT K ING A LF R a background of renewed national E D P L interest in royal bones following the discovery of Richard III in Leicester – OUTER COURT K ING A LFR E D a ‘faculty petition’ (that is, a request TE R R for permission) was submitted to His Prayers were led byINNER the COURT Bishop of

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n Hon. Judge Christopher Clark, Q.C. Basingstokea before the opening of the b r

ub the Chancellor of the Diocese of UnmarkedS Grave. Photo: BBC/Hyde900. Winchester in connection with the

E N M R ONK O S R T O bones in the Unmarked Grave. X AD

S A

Y H

FORECOURT K ING A LF R E D P L

OUTER COURT

K ING A LFR E D TE R R Plan of Hyde Abbey overlaid on the INNER COURT contemporary street layout. Image: Dr Christine Grover

HYDE900 8 The Hyde900 Investigation 2010-2014: The Results

he results from Professor Higham at Oxford finally resolved the ‘Mystery of the Unmarked Grave’. It had Tcontained bones from five individuals whose dates ranged from 1230 to 1500 and who displayed a wide variety of degenerative conditions suggesting that they might, possibly, have ended their lives in the abbey’s Representatives from the University of infirmary. In addition, there was one Winchester, the Diocese of Winchester individual who dated from around and Hyde900 meet with the Revd. Canon the year 1100 indicating that he could Cliff Bannister at the Unmarked Grave to have been amongst the first cohort of plan its excavation. Dr. Katie Tucker, who monks who moved from New Minster led the excavation, is second from right. to Hyde Abbey. Collectively these findings represented a fascinating link with the history of the Abbey in medieval times. The ‘pelvis revelation’

eanwhile, however, Dr. Tucker also took the opportunity to re- examine some of the Mhuman remains which had been found (but never carbon dated) by the 1999 ‘Search for Alfred’ community dig. It was decided that a number of these bones should also be tested by Professor Higham.

This produced a startling discovery which established a firm connection The ‘Power Pelvis’ with the Royal House of Wessex. dating from the late 9th to early A pelvis was identified which dated 10th century from the end of the ninth century or found in the altar the years of the tenth century. This area of Hyde made it definitely a ‘New Minster’ Abbey, making it bone (the first ever found) and, given very likely that it its context and age, there is a strong belonged to either likelihood that it belonged to either King Alfred or King King Alfred or King Edward. Edward.

The ‘Search for Alfred the Great’ was not over but a major clue had been found as evidence that his remains were not lost for ever – but, instead, were still waiting, possibly, to be revealed (albeit scattered and shattered) within the grounds of Hyde Abbey. Dr Katie Tucker Professor Tom A new chapter has opened in the examining the bones Higham with fascinating, posthumous story of King at the University of the radiocarbon Alfred the Great. Winchester. accelerator at Oxford University.

HYDE900 9 Why Is King Alfred Regarded As ‘Great’?

LFRED THE GREAT was a pivotal and landmark A WORTHY TITLE figure in Engliah history, During the years 871 and 899, at proving to be a towering a critical point in English history, figureA in both war and peace. Alfred proved to be a ‘Great; • Military leader, Born in 849, as the youngest son of • Statesman and administrator, King Ethelwulf, he was never expected • Law giver, to become king. But as his fathers and • Educational pioneer older brothers died – worn out in part And by relentless battles – Alfred took • Patron Of The Church@ on the mantle of national leader just as it seemed Wessex could fall to the invading Vikings. Victorian statue of Alfred, Winchester High Street. Photo: Joe Low Over the next 25 years Alfred turned the tide on the invaders, drew up secure borders with the Danelaw (the area occupied by the Vikings) and re-built the foundations of the Anglo-Saxon state, military and legal infrastructure. He also invested in re-invigorating scholarship and education as well as strengthening the Christian church. No wonder he was described by the Ealdorman Aethelweard as the ‘Unshakeable pillar of the western people.’

His principal achievements include

• defeating in battle and then turning the tide on the pagan Viking invaders who threatened to take-over all the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms • stabilizing Wessex and establishing it as a base from which his son and grandson could then progressively unite England • re-invigorating learning in England following the depredations of the The ‘Alfred Jewel’, made of Vikings enamel, quartz and gold, is one • establishing a strong administration of the most popular exhibits • promoting the use of the English at the Ashmolean Museum. language for government and Dating from the reign of Alfred scholarship its Anglo Saxon inscription means • publishing a new law code “Alfred Ordered Me Made”. The • weaving England back into the jewel was once attached to a rod and used for political and cultural network of pointing to words when reading from a book. western European Illustration: Sophie Cunningham Dawe. • establishing an effective system of Royal administration A coin depicting King Alfred discovered at New Minster In many respects an essential core of by Professor Martin Biddle Englishness was consolidated under during his 1960s excavations. the leadership and influence of King Photo: Winchester Museums. Alfred. His influence can still be seen today – especially in a city like Winchester!

Acknowledgements Hyde900 wishes to express its admiration and appreciation of the work undertaken by Dr. Katie Tucker together with the support offered by the University of Winchester. It also wishes to thank Winchester Museums Service, the Diocese of Winchester, the Revd. Canon Cliff Bannister, the congregation of St. Bartholomew and the community of Hyde. It is also grateful for the support of Chris Granlund and the BBC.